Neverwhere

gga

Like Wrath of a Mad God this is fantasy too: but this is
a completely different proposition. This is good, very, very
good. Good enough that I will recommend this to non-fantasy reading
friends. Ahhh… A breakout hit - the dream of fantasy authors the
world over. Well, here’s a tip: instead of sucking, try writing high
quality, original, funny and genuninely moving stories, like, say,
this.

The poignancy. It’s not cloying, there’s no preaching. Not even any
condescension, patronisation or pity. This is a tale of those who fall
through the cracks. Those you don’t notice around you; the other
nation outside, in the words of Billy Bragg, sleeping in the street. A
tale of the disenfranchised, the dispossessed. told so well. So
clearly, so directly, with no pathetic efforts to tug at the heart
strings that, for me, this became the most moving story since Greene’s
The Quiet American.

But it’s fantasy. How can a fantasy novel seriously be mentioned in
the same breath as Graham Greene? Well, I’m going to have to try to
justify that. On the surface, and the back cover, Neverwhere is a
fantasy adventure set in a strange, fantastical world at once beneath
and entwined within everyday London. This world intersects with London
through the streets and the homeless. Richard Mayhew is pulled from
our world into this other place. Forced onto a quest all he really
wants is to be able to return home.

Viewed as a fantasy creation, this other world is a joy. Full of
magic, grand quests and the most imaginative etymologies for major
London landmarks: I certainly wished I knew London better. To get the
right feeling I was able to transplant Sydney in place of
London. Enough wandering in the City, Surry Hills, Pyrmont and Balmain
and you have the feeling that there is history, and history on history
here. And beyond that, it’s dark. Frighteningly, unexpectedly dark.

Like Midnight’s Children
though, I read Neverwhere in two ways. As well as the straight
forward fantasy interpretation, you could also see this as a story
told by an unreliable narrator. What if the weird, fantastical world
beneath London’s streets doesn’t exist? I mean, not even within the
world of the book? What if that entire world is inside of Richard
Mayhew’s mind and he just doesn’t know it? And for me, that
possibility made this a touching, poignant story. A story genuinely of
those who fall through the cracks; into a world that is both magical,
frightening and very dangerous.

Unfortunately, to make you believe I’ll have to cite
specifics. Without spoiling, I’d point at the third quest for the
Blackfriars. When you read that scene think about alternate
explanations.